


The Voyage Home

by burkygirl



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fairy Tale Elements, Mermaid Katniss, Victor Peeta
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-31
Updated: 2017-05-12
Packaged: 2018-08-12 07:07:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7925311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burkygirl/pseuds/burkygirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
 <img/>
</p><p>Hunger Games Victor Peeta Mellark is struggling with his new life after the Games when an unexpected encounter on the beach one morning changes everything. In-Panem AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A/N The title of this story and the song within come from the Australian version of a Gaelic folk song, the Water is Wide. (Just in case you want to hear the tune.) The first 1,000 words of this chapter formed a drabble I wrote for JavisTG’s birthday. Many thanks to her for the inspiration, to loving-mellark for the bee-U-tee-full banner and the amazing peetabreadgirl and xerxia for their general awesomeness.

I’ve been up all night, thinking, which is almost a welcome respite from reliving the nightmare of the Games in my dreams every night. The surge of relief that crested over me as they hoisted me from the arena was replaced almost immediately by a creeping dread, a suspicion that while I survived, I would never be free. The programmed speeches and pageantry of Victory Tour were already confirming this new truth when Finnick Odair hissed warnings in my ears as we clasped hands and embraced on the stage today in the centre of District 4. _Smile, Peeta. You need to be careful. The Game is just getting started._

He kept it going all day while he played benevolent host, performing the requisite tour around his district, showing me the thatched homes that hugged the shoreline near the docks where the fishers pull in their catch to be loaded in train cars for the Capitol. As cameras rolled and on-lookers and hangers-on gaped at whatever maritime marvel the Capitol’s golden boy had on display, Finnick passed behind me in the crowd, whispering under his breath. _Watch your back, Peeta._ When someone paid me a compliment over dinner, he made a face. _They’re going to love you in the Capitol._

His words are still rolling through my mind, hours after the day is done. The party guests have finally left the mayor’s house. The prep team that is constantly primping and fussing over me has, at last, left me to my own devices. From my bedroom window in the usually vacant house on the cliff where the Victor’s Village is located, I watch the waves surge onto the beach while I analyze all the possible meanings of his words, each one more frightening and depressing than the one before it. Unable to stand another second in my own head, I throw open the garden doors to the terrace, crossing swiftly into the garden and down the rickety wooden steps to the beach in the early dawn light. The sea water snakes around my ankles as I walk along the shoreline, the wet sand squishing between my toes.

There is a fence in District 12 that the Capitol claims keeps us safe from the wildlife, but really only serves to pen us in. There is no fence in this part of District 4. Instead, the ocean stretches endlessly before me. As the salt air fills my lungs, I stare at the horizon and watch the sun begin its ascent to the heavens, my heart lifting for the first time since my name was pulled from the reaping ball. I close my eyes, trying to hold on to this moment; breathe in the crisp clean smell of the ocean, clasping tightly to the soaring, fluttering feeling in my heart. I promise myself I will paint this moment later and hang it over the mantlepiece in that empty mausoleum they claim is my new home. I’ll call it Freedom.

When her song reaches my ears, I freeze. This is a private beach, reserved for Victors and I saw no one when I came down the steps. From my spot in the surf, I follow the sound until I find her, sitting on a rock near the edge of the water, her long dark hair blowing in the breeze. Her olive skin glows in the dawn, drawing me in.

_The water is wide, I cannot get o'er_

_And neither have I wings to fly,_

_Build me a boat that can carry two_

_And both shall row, my love and I._

I haven’t quite made it to her side when she speaks, her back still turned to me.

“It took you long enough.”

Her curt tone startles me.

“What? I don’t know what you mean.”

She whirls around and her eyes, the same hue as the sky before a storm, practically pin me in place. “I’ve been waiting for you all night, Peeta Mellark, while you stared out the window. Now the sun is almost completely up and I have to go.”

She heaves a sigh and it’s only as her chest rises and falls that I am able to tear my eyes from her gaze and realize her breasts are completely bare. My dick twitches to life as I gaze at them, round and soft, and much more natural than the surgically enhanced tits of the Capitol women in the dirty book my older brother keeps under his mattress back home. He managed to trade a bag of cookies for it from that peacekeeper, Darius.

“Well?” She’s still annoyed.

I force my eyes back up to her face. “I’m sorry,” I reply, wondering if women typically go topless at the beach in this District. “This is a private beach. I’m not sure how you got down here, but I don’t think you’re supposed to be here.”

She gives me a puzzled look. “I swam up, of course. It’s my 18th birthday. How else was I going to meet you?”

I gape at her like a fish. A half naked woman swam up on a beach to meet me?

“How do you know my name?” It’s a stupid question, really. The whole country watched me wrestle a boy from District 2 to the ground and then slit his throat with my knife. I am a household name.

“It came to me in a dream,” she says, as she slips off the rock into the water.

“You don’t have to go back that way,” I tell her and turn to point to the steps behind me. “You can just come up the steps. I’ll get you a shirt in the house, and…”

She laughs, and when I turn to face her, she’s already up to her waist in the water. “I’ll be fine, Peeta.”

I chase her out into the water until it licks at my knees. “Wait! I don’t even know your name!”

Her arms sweep and swirl through the water, holding her in place. “It’s Katniss,” she calls, and then turns and jumps into the surf. And where I expect to see slender legs, the scales on her lower body glisten in the morning light. Her tailfin rises high in the air and then disappears, slipping below the surface.

* * *

 

My knife digs into the bark of the tree beside me, carving a deep notch. I don’t know what possessed me to climb under the fence and start into the woods. I haven’t done it since I was a kid, when my mother pronounced that as the littlest, it would be my job to crawl under the fence to harvest berries and apples. Produce from the Capitol was expensive and it often arrived overripe or full of worms. It didn’t matter to her that I would be whipped in the square if I was caught. She said it would save our family’s bakery some money, and none of us ever dared to disagree with her.

But this morning, after yet another restless night, I was overcome with a desperate urge to get out of the house. I had baked enough bread for an army the night before, so I made my way to the Seam and left loaves on as many doorsteps as I could before wandering over to the meadow full of wildflowers not far from the dilapidated shacks where the coal miners try to raise their children. The electric fence that surrounds our district skirts the edge of the field, but you can find spaces here and there to crawl under and go off into the woods. Eventually, I found a gap large enough for a man to slip through and scrambled beneath the wire.

I stayed close to the fence when my mother sent me foraging as a child, but today, I am following a trail that leads deep into the trees. It must have been made by Gale Hawthorne. His father died in a mine collapse when we were kids and Gale was left to provide for the huge family that was left behind. He crawls under the fence routinely to hunt and then sells what his family doesn’t need for extra money. The peacekeepers turn a blind eye to his poaching. I’ve never been able to figure out if that’s because they enjoy the fresh game, or they know that no one else has the nerve to so blatantly flaunt the law. He used to routinely stop at the bakery and sell to my father, but not once has he made the trip to the Victor’s Village to sell to me.

I always envied Gale when we were in school. He wore rags every day, but no one ever gave him the pitying looks they gave to me. Gale was the fierce provider for a family who adored him, unafraid of the unknown dangers of the woods. I was the guy who routinely showed up with bruises on his face. If Gale had been reaped instead of me, his house in the Village would most assuredly not be empty with only Haymitch Abernathy, my ‘mentor’, next door for company.

Not that Haymitch is much to look up to. The one time he sobered up enough to chat, he said I should be glad my family refused my offer to move in with me. That it’s better that way. And since I sleep with a knife on the table beside me, I guess he’s probably right. I left the Arena a killer. If my mother were to lose her temper and get up to her old tricks, I’m not sure what would happen.

I pull my knife from my pocket again and cut a notch into another tree, glancing behind me to make sure that I can still see the last one. I hope I’m doing this often enough to be able to find my way back out. I’m not excited by the idea of being in the woods after dark. There were some nights hidden along the banks of a stream in the Arena that I’d rather not relive.

I’ve been hiking for over an hour when I hear the song of the mockingjays on the breeze and the hair stands up on the back of my neck.

_The water is wide, I cannot get o'er..._

It’s the song, the one that poked into my mind as I drifted off to sleep, all winter long. It still is, actually. When Cato looms over me bragging about how he plans to use the massive rock in his hand to crack open my skull, the silky sound of her voice soothes my soul. Music I surely imagined, but in the dark of night, I seek it’s comfort without shame.

The birds soar over my head and sing snippets of the song to each other from the trees, while my heart pounds wildly. It is not possible. Surely, the dark haired beauty on the beach in District 4 was the product of an exhausted and troubled mind. Mermaids do not exist. I knew this before I met her, and still I’d combed all the books in the library of the house in District 4, looking for any tales of seafolk. I’d searched the books in my house too, and found nothing but disappointment. The medical books on the effects of anxiety and exhaustion, on the other hand, were more helpful.

I carry on with my walk and another bird swoops down from the sky, perching high above me in an ancient oak. It has a new line.

_And neither have I wings to fly….._

I try to remember everything I’ve ever been told about mockingjays. They aren’t supposed to exist. They are a hybrid of the jabberjays the Capitol created to listen for any rebel activity in the districts, and the simple mockingbirds whose song once filled the forests of Panem. They only repeat what they hear. Which means, someone, not very far away, is filling the air with a song I heard for the first time six months ago. But that’s impossible. She wasn’t real.

I press on, slashing at the brush blocking my way with my knife; inexplicably following the bird song ever further into the forest, even as I mentally kick myself for giving into the hallucination. When the trees begin to spread out, an expanse of blue peeks out from between them, stopping me in my tracks. I had no idea there was a body of water out here. Of course, other than Gale Hawthorne, no one in District 12 truly knows what lies beyond the fence. And judging by the brush I’ve just cut down, it’s possible that even he’s never been this far into the woods. I pinch my arm, just to make sure that I’m not dreaming. It’s then her voice drifts to me on the breeze, luring me in. My feet propel me forward and I lack the will to stop them. When at last I step out of the trees, I find myself on the shore of a small lake. The jagged peaks of the mountains rise high beyond it, and the shores are studded with evergreen trees.

She’s floating in the water today, her song flying toward the sky.

_I leaned my back up against an oak,_

_To find it was a trusty tree,_

_I found you true, love, when first you spoke,_

_'tis true you are, and ever shall be._

My feet have barely touched the sand when she speaks.

“Do all humans sound like thunder when they move, Peeta Mellark, or does that honour belong solely to you?”

Just like last time, she leaves me speechless.

“I’m sorry?”

“I heard you approaching about a league ago.”

“How did you know it was me? And how did you get here?”

She sighs and rolls over onto her belly, before swimming closer, her arms cutting through the water in graceful strokes.

“You have a lot of nightmares.”

Right. My breath comes out in a frustrated huff. More vague answers from the apparition who is not supposed to exist. This is stress, exhaustion, loneliness. What it’s not, is real, and I need to stop entertaining this hallucination and just go home. I’ve already started back towards the woods when she calls out to me again.

“Peeta Mellark, wait.”

My hands slap against my thighs as I turn around. She’s sitting in the shallows now, and for the first time, I can see her shape clearly. Long dark hair that frames a heart-shaped face. Olive skin, cast over a form that is both slender and sleek. Her breasts are still bare, and between them is nestled a shell that hangs from some kind of braided rope tied around the column of her neck. And while her beauty has me wishing for my paint box or a pencil; her tail, glistening like jewels spilling from her lap into the lake, lends her an ethereal quality I know I will never be able to replicate, no matter how many hours I spend mixing colours.

She bites her lip and twirls one long, wet strand of hair around her forefinger. “I’m not good at explaining things.”

The distress on her face tugs at me, but I stand my ground. “Try.” So much for my plan to ignore her.

“There aren’t many merfolk left, Peeta Mellark,” she says with a scowl. “Fewer still that allow themselves to be seen. Do you want to hear what I have to say or not?”

That is a very good question. I want to know everything about her, especially what she wants from me. I sigh and travel back across the sand, crouching down beside her.

“Tell me.” She gives me an annoyed look again. “Please, Katniss.”

She swallows and trails a finger through the glassy surface of the lake. “On the eve of her 18th birthday, a mermaid dreams of her mate,” she says, softly. “And she can, if she chooses, leave our home to seek him out, wherever he is, as long as there’s a natural body of water.”

I’m stunned by the implications of what she’s saying. I found her on the beach in District 4 on her birthday, after all. I can’t process what that means just yet. Instead, I ask how many actually seek out their ‘mate.’ This, it seems, is easier for her to answer.

“Almost all seek the one they dream of, but not many of us dream of a human mate. Usually, it’s a merman. The maids who dream of human men usually think it’s better, safer to just stay away. Live their lives alone.”

“Why?”

Her eyes flash when she answers. “It’s dangerous, Peeta. The waters aren’t safe like they were long ago when merfolk were plentiful. We seldom leave our home because of it. Men don’t trust their eyes anymore. They don’t believe in magic. And a maid needs to decide if he’s worthy of be trusted with the knowledge of our existence.”

I’m surprised by the idea that she thinks I could be worth anything.  My family certainly doesn’t think so. The Capitol reveres me for being a killer.

“And what do you think, Katniss? Am I worthy?”

The fire in her eyes dims, and then she closes the shutters, looking down into the water yet again. “I haven’t decided yet.”

I grin and then rock back on my heels until my rear settles in the sand. “You’ll make up your mind when you find out that I can’t swim.”

The expression on her face is so incredulous, it makes me laugh. “How is that possible?”

“Well, when you grow up in a district where there’s no place to swim and you start to work as soon as you can hold a cookie cutter, swimming isn’t exactly a priority.”

Her tail splashes in the water and she scowls so fiercely that I have to hold up my hands in defence.

“Okay, okay,” I chuckle. “But I’m not technically supposed to be out here, and I didn’t know this lake existed until today.”

“Someone knew. Once,” she says, with a nod to an empty concrete structure near the shore of the lake. I guess people must have lived here, once upon a time, before the Dark Days.

“Yeah,” I swallow. “A long time ago.”

“Why aren’t you supposed to be here?”

How do you explain to someone who seems to be able to travel at will about a fence that keeps us penned in like animals? “This place is…” I frown, not sure how to make her understand. “Beyond the limits of my district. Being here is… dangerous, for us.”

A wrinkled forms in her brow as she considers my words. “Like when we leave our home.” I think about the dangers she could face -- fishing boats, sharks, scientists and their endless batteries of tests.

“Something like that,” I tell her and am relieved when she accepts my explanation and starts to scoot away from the shore.

“Get in the water, Peeta Mellark, and I’ll teach you to swim.” I hesitate. The last thing I want is to make a fool of myself in front of the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen, real or not. Human, or otherwise. A wave of water washes over me, bringing me back to myself. She’s laughing, her tail still poised in the air. “What is this? A brave warrior such as yourself afraid of a little water?”

She thinks of me as a warrior? “I’m not a…”

“Get in, Peeta Mellark, I’ll decide that for myself.”

“Peeta.” I correct her. “Just Peeta.”

She frowns. “Your name is not Peeta Mellark?”

It is, I tell her, as I struggle to my feet and wrestle out of my shirt. “But humans have more than one name. Peeta is the name my parents gave me, like Katniss,” I explain from the inside of my shirt. I manage to get out of it and toss it to the ground before reaching for the button on my pants. “But Mellark is my family name. It comes from my father.” I drop my pants onto the sand and step out of them, before gathering it all up to hang over a nearby bush.

When I turn back around, clad only in my shorts, her cheeks are crimson. “It’s alright if you see me,” I reassure her, though I‘m amused that a bare-chested mermaid is embarrassed by a little skin. “I don’t mind.”

She crosses her arms whips around, turning her back to me. “Put your skin back on, Peeta Mellark. I have not agreed to have you yet.”

“Nor have I,” I remind her. “And I thought you wanted to teach me to swim?”

She whips around and sputters, “But I can see your legs!” She waves her arms at me. She’s so indignant, I’m finding it hard not to laugh.

“Yes, Katniss. Every human has two of them. They’re covered by skin.” I frown down at the red scar on my left one. “I was lucky to keep that one. Cato cut it right to the bone. Another day in the arena and…” I stop forcing my mind of that track. Nothing good ever comes from me dwelling on the games.

She folds her arms under her naked breasts and sends another impatient scowl my way. And suddenly, I get it. She’s never seen clothes before.

“I can’t remove my skin, Katniss. And I can’t swim in my clothes,” I explain, gesturing to the fabric heaped on the unfortunate alder.

“Clothes?”

“Clothes,” I explain. “Humans wear them to keep us warm and to protect our skin. But we don’t wear them swimming. But I’ve left my shorts on, you have nothing to worry about.”

She looks at me intently for a few seconds before whirling around and swimming further out into the water, muttering to herself. I think I hear the words ‘mother’ and ‘fit’ cross her lips, while I stand stand on the shore in my shorts wondering whether to just get dressed and go home.

“I don’t hear any noise back there, Peeta,” she calls over her shoulder, “Are you coming or not?”

Right. Swimming. For the first time in my life with a creature who’s not supposed to exist. Still, if we don’t go out too far, it shouldn’t matter. As long as I can put my feet on the ground, I should be fine.

I take a deep breath. The apple blossoms are still on the trees and it’s probably too soon for swimming, but I plunge into the icy lake anyway. It steals my breath away.

Katniss looks at me smugly. “It’s spring fed,” she advises just seconds after my testicles go into hiding. When the water is at my stomach, I suck in another deep breath.

“This is far enough, right?”

“Nope.” She pops the p and holds out her arms. “Your first lesson is to learn how to float. I need you to lay across my arms.” I push through the water until I’m beside her, the water flowing around my chest.

“Come on,” she says impatiently, waving her arms in the water. Lay down on your stomach. I won’t drop you.”

The skepticism must show on my face, because she rolls her eyes. “Just jump up here, Peeta. I’ll catch you. The water will support most of your weight.”

A few seconds later, I’m surprised to find myself stretched across her slender limbs. This close, I can see the strength in the sinewy muscles of her arms. I try to focus on those rather than the soft breasts pressing into my side. And for the first time since I waded out here, I’m thankful for the frigid water.

“You need to relax your body, let the water do all the work.”

It’s impossible to relax, with my face just inches from the lake. “Talk to me,” I beg.

I hear, rather than see, the scowl. “About what?”

“Anything you want,” I reply. “Tell me about your home.”

Her body goes rigid for a minute, and I bite my lip and hope that she doesn’t drop me. Then she exhales slowly.

“My home is in a city that sank below the waves many years ago,” she begins, and entrances me with a tale of a great city full of people. Humans, who lived at peace with the merfolk who lived in the sea caves near its shores.

“Before the Dark Days?”

She gives me a confused look and I ask if it occurred before the great war that destroyed most of the human population. She frowns. “The Time of the Sky Fire? No, well before that.”

I don’t know what to say to that. Our education in District 12 began with the Dark Days. I know nothing of the time before. Katniss seems to ignore my silence and takes it as a signal to continue.

“It was very common then, for a mermaid to dream of a human mate, and if she accepted him, they lived freely, between the land and sea. Their children were of both. It was a time of harmony and peace for both our peoples. We flourished. The merfolk farmed and cared for the sea and the humans did the same on the land. We lived that way, in seclusion, for generations.”

I try to imagine being free to live as I choose, rising to bake bread for my children. Watching them play and then carrying their lunch to the beach before diving beneath the waves. Little faces swim into my imagination, one with rich, dark locks and blue eyes; the other with piercing grey eyes and blonde curls.

“What happened?”

“There was an attack in the night by an army. My people heard the pounding of their weapons under the water and when they came to the surface, the air was full of screams and fire. They were farmers and fishers. Pitch forks and tridents were no defence against booming weapons that breathed fire. The invaders wanted our wealth, and our secrets. Many of our people were trapped on the land. Men, women and children; it didn’t matter. They were all slaves to be sold, abused. And while they stole our crops and raided our city, those who were trapped on the land managed to protect their families and convince their captors that the stories of the merfolk were only a legend.”

I am so engrossed in the story that I hardly notice when she loosens her grip on my chest.

“My ancestors, those who were under the sea the night of the attack, took their families deep into the sea caves. More than half of our population was gone and they were very afraid the enemy would attempt to enslave us. They were even more afraid of what would happen to the people they loved who were trapped in the city.”

She drops her arms suddenly, and I am shocked to realize that I am still floating on the water. She slips around to face me, with delight in her eyes and a pleased smile on her lips.

“You’re doing great, Peeta. Now, move one arm to your side and you’ll flip to your back.” I do as I’m told and am surprised to find myself staring into the sun. I close my eyes against it while it bears down against my chest, bringing a welcome warmth in contrast to the icy water below me. Our faces are so close together that I can smell the sea on her skin and her eyelashes tickle my temple. Her hands rest on my sides, just below my sternum. Even in the cold lake, her palms feel like fire against me. My boxer shorts are clinging to me and I think of every unsexy thing I can imagine until I’m certain my body isn’t going to betray me.

“So how did the city end up underwater?”

Her cheeks twitch into a frown. “Those of my people who weren’t in the city the night of the attack hid in the sea caves for days upon days, waiting for the invaders to leave. But our waters were full of fish and the fields were fertile. Then, they began to see our men being used as field hands. They were ragged and hungry. There was no sign of the women or children. The elders began to fear the worst and a council was called. A group of volunteers agreed to go on a rescue mission. The first Katniss was among them.”

She must feel the way I startle because she tightens her grip on me. “The first Katniss?” Katniss explains that the names of the volunteers who snuck into the city are passed down in each generation so that they are not forgotten.The first Katniss was a priestess and a fisher. She led the volunteers into the city using the underwater tunnels that led to caverns beneath it.

“To the invaders, the caverns seemed to have no value, but they were all-important to our people. They were used as a sacred space, where marriages were performed between the merfolk and the humans, where children with merblood took their first swim, or first came to land.”

“Did they get them out?

Katniss is quiet for a minute, and then she shakes her head. “They came to ground in the middle of the night and snuck into the city. It was silent, and it smelled of rot and decay. The guards were asleep at their posts. They made their way to the centre of town. The Army had moved into the homes that surrounded the marketplace. The men were being held in a pen that had once been used for cattle. They were chained together and the chains were staked to the ground. They were starving. Beaten. The children were...” She inhales deeply, and I feel her quiver, as though she is reliving this story instead of telling an ancient tale. “The children were dead. Stacked up in the middle of the city for burning. And the women, well…” She trails off, unable to carry on.

I don’t need her to tell me what happened to the women. They would have been spoils of war to be used at will, nearly as disposable as the children. I push my feet down and stand, turning to find her staring off into space with glassy eyes. She shakes her head and blinks back the tears. I touch her shoulder and speak her name softly.

“Sorry,” she says, trying to shake it off. “They teach us the story from an early age. I know it happened a long long time ago, but it’s real all the same.” She takes a deep breath. “The men’s eyes -- they were empty. The first Katniss was filled with grief and rage. She had begged the elders to launch a rescue mission immediately, and they had refused. Now the children were dead, the men were broken and there was no way to know what the state of the remaining women would be. She seized a flaming torch to begin the search when another volunteer stilled her hand. He told her they were probably dead. That it would be better if they were all dead and then he pointed to the barrels of powder that they knew belonged to the invaders.”

I began to trudge through the water back to shore, imagining the volunteers, moving through the streets of an ancient town, rolling the barrels in front of them. The guards, asleep on the job, must have been arrogant enough to believe the only remaining risk was a few escaped slaves.

I settled on the beach to dry out and Katniss perched on a rock beside me, her tail dangling into the water.

A breeze blows and goosebumps break out on my arms and legs.

“My people rolled the barrels down into the caves. Katniss threw her torch onto the pile and my people leaped into the water, following Katniss through the darkness and back to the sea. A roar echoed from under the city onto the water. Fire blew out through the caverns, sending rocks and earth flying high into the air and sinking the invaders’ ships. The next morning, as my people tended the sea, a powerful shudder moved through the water rattling their bones as though their bodies were a gong that had been struck. Thinking they were once more under attack, they raced toward the surface, only to find that city was crumbling and the island sinking into the sea. By nightfall, it was gone.”

I say nothing for a few minutes, listening to the birds sing while the lake laps at the shore. Katniss flicks her tail against the water and looks at me expectantly. Waiting for me to judge her ancestors or something? Not likely. “They were right, you know? After something like that, you’re just not the same anymore.”

Her silver gaze sharpens, wordlessly demanding I explain myself, but I’m too cold for that, so I stand up and start looking for stones to place in a circle. I rip out some dry grass and find some brush near the treeline and drag it back to the shore. I heap it all into a pile and set about using the only skill I learned at the Training Centre that is good for anything outside the arena. I quickly coax a fire out of two sticks and soon it is crackling away. Katniss says nothing, watching the whole procedure curiously.

“You are cold?”

I nod as I head back for the treeline, intent on snapping off some larger branches to feed the fire. “It’s a bit early for swimming, really,” I tell her as I return, settling my foot on the centre of the branches and snapping them in half, over and over, until I have a small, useable pile. I crouch down and begin to feed them to the fire.

“Tell me about your nightmares.”

I frown. I don’t know how she knows about my dreams. I don’t want to talk about them - ever.  “They’re not dreams,” I say, using a stick to poke at the coals. Sparks fly high into the sky.

She purses her lips, and turns her face to the sun. It is high in the sky now, practically noon. “They are memories?”

“Yes.”

“Yours?”

It seems like an odd question, but I tell her yes anyway. “How do you know about them?”

Her eyes meet mine. “We are connected, you and I, until I make my decision.”

This seems rather unlikely, but then, the whole thing is completely crazy. Still, the connection explains her song in my sleep. I poke the fire some more.

“I hear you, at night.”

She stares at the fire, twisting a lock of her hair into a tight coil around her finger, chewing lightly on her bottom lip. “You are not alone in the dream world as long as the connection between us exists.”

Oddly, this feels like a comfort rather than an invasion. “What if you decide you don’t want me?”

Her eyes snap from the fire and onto me, the flames flickering in her pupils. “Then you will forget and I will go home.”

“And what about me? Do I have a choice in this?”

Her tail twitches in irritation. “The final choice must be yours. Made freely. My people mate for life, Peeta Mellark. This is not a game.”

I don’t know where the bark of laughter comes from inside of me, but I feel it cross my lips, wrapped in a long repressed fury.

“Trust me, I know all about games, Katniss.”

Her tail slaps against the water, and the fire stutters as the spray rains upon it. She drops down into the water and begins to push herself out into deeper water. Before long she’s waist deep and I’m still sitting on the beach with sand in my underwear.

“I’m going home,” she calls, and dives beneath the surface.

I’m left on the beach with a dying fire. I sigh and push myself up into a standing position, pull on my clothes and throw some sand on the coals to smother them.

I stand at the edge of the water, now transformed into a sheet of glass. I wait, hands on hips, for her to resurface, but she does not. Nothing is left except for the smouldering remains of my fire and her song on the air. Finally I sigh, brushing the sand from my hair and turn to the woods. I begin the long walk home and for once, my mind is not on the Games. Instead, I’m dwelling on whether I’ll ever see her again, if in fact she was real. And then her parting words echo in my ear and I can’t help but wonder if questioning what I saw is all part of the process of erasing her from my memory.

I’m just not sure that I want to forget.


	2. Chapter 2

  
My paintbrush whips through the air and smacks against the wall, leaving a splat of green on the stark white surface before clattering to the wood floor. I want to pull my hair out in frustration. I’ve spent hours - hours - trying to get her tail right and no matter what I try, I am unable to do it justice. Her eyes are another problem. I can get the silver of her irises just right, but the mystery in their depths is still missing.

I pace the speckled floor in what was once a pristine study. The hardwood is now flecked with almost every colour that has ever graced my palette and all the fancy Capitol furniture is piled high in the corner.

My eyes drift to the portrait again. Flat. The work is flat. Uninspired. If I could just get some rest, maybe I could get it right; but a full night’s sleep had evaded me for two weeks. Since the Games, really, if I’m honest. But it has been especially bad of late. I glance at the clock on the wall and I wonder if I am sufficiently tired to at least catch a couple of hours before the nightmares awake me again.

I flick out the light with a sigh, wandering down the hall and picking up yesterday’s mail from the mat at the front door. As usual, there’s a fat stack waiting for me. Ten or so letters from the Capitol that reek of perfume. Fan mail. How much longer am I going to have to ignore it before it stops? They land with a smack on the little half moon table standing against the wall nearby. A thick, creamy envelope bears the Presidential seal. I break it open with shaking hands to find an invitation to the opening gala of the 75th Hunger Games. My stomach roils and heaves at the idea of going back. I’ll be a mentor this year, a Quarter Quell year. What fresh hell will the gamemakers have in store for such an auspicious occasion? Undoubtedly, there will be more ghosts haunting the corners of my bedroom and starring in my dreams by fall. There is a flat package from Portia too. Designs, I suppose; this time for suits to wear during the official events tied to the Games. That one joins the rest on the pile on the table. I’ll look at it in the morning.

I flick off the hall lights and head up to the master suite at the top of the stairs. I’m not very far into my bedtime routine before my mind wanders back to Katniss. The first night after she’d swam away from me, I was shocked not to hear her voice in my dreams.

Instead, my dreams were filled with flashes of me; moving through crowds -- golden and glowing in the sun of District 4, exhausted and haunted on the beach the next morning, angry and sullen by the fire. Along with the visions came a jumble of feelings I have yet to make sense of; curiosity, confusion, a tremulous excitement tinged by a healthy dose of fear, and then an overwhelming hurt that nearly chokes me with its intensity. Convinced she was trying to reach out to me, I leapt from my bed as soon as it was light enough to see in the woods, eager to find her in the water, waiting for me. I would apologize, explain myself so that we could start over. But when I arrived, breathless from the run through the forest, the lake lapped neatly against the shore. The birds, having long abandoned the mermaid’s song, were tweeting softly to each other on the breeze and the only evidence of my visit the day before was the charred remains of my fire.

Since then, nothing. Two weeks without any sense of her in my dreams. I can only assume that she’s made her decision and the tie between us has been severed. If it ever existed at all. If she ever existed at all. Either way, I can’t say I’m enjoying having my dreams all to myself again.

I lay flat on my back in my king-size bed. The sheer curtains ripple as the early summer breeze wafts into the room and over me. It’s so damn quiet up here on the hill. I miss the near-constant hum of the bakery and the street noise of the town. The tree outside my window waves back and forth in time with the curtains. I watch as it sways out toward the little courtyard between my house and Haymitch’s place and then swings back toward my window. Out again. Back. The leaves quiver and rustle as the branch rocks toward me again. It’s soothing, almost hypnotic.

When the leaves brush against my face, I hack the branch out of the way with my knife and continuing pushing through the dense forest. I check behind me to make sure Katniss is still there. She gives me a grim nod and so I push forward until I reach the edge of the forest.

The sun is setting and it’s getting colder. I know what this means. It’s the finale. The shoulder of Katniss’s jacket brushes against my own as she stands beside me. She’s as human as I am tonight.

“Stay close,” I whisper, as I gently lift a branch in search of the only other remaining tribute in the arena. He’s hiding inside the cornucopia, just like he does every night.

“Where is he?” she replies. I nod toward the metallic horn of plenty, shining under the manufactured moon. She frowns and raises her bow, adjusting her stance and positioning her arrow, drawing it back until the string taut against her cheek.

“Katniss?”

She shushes me. “I’ll draw him out.” She lets her arrow fly high into the air and it rattles noisily when it falls against the metal roof of the cornucopia. Something moves inside. We’ve startled him. Katniss nods to the right. “Come at him from that side,” she whispers. “I’ll draw him to the left once you’re in position.”

“Why are you doing this?”

“Go!” She shoves me the way she wants me to move and slinks off into the brush in the opposite direction. I find an ideal spot where I can’t be seen from the cornucopia and watch her draw her weapon once more. It pings off the side of the giant horn and this time, Cato creeps outside. His sword glistens in the moonlight. I run, my feet moving faster than they’ve ever moved before and I tackle him from behind.

His sword drops to the ground as we tumble onto the hard packed earth outside. I land a few swift jabs to his kidneys, as Cato scrabbles across the grass, finally wrapping his fist around the hilt of his sword. I’m still on my knees when he rolls and slashes at my leg. The slice feels like lightning tearing through my thigh; its white heat throbs as I fall to the ground. I await what should almost certainly be the final plunge of his sword through my heart. Instead, he jumps me, talking incessantly about how this will make him a hero. A Victor. If he only knew.

“Do it,” I urge him. “Put me out of my misery.”

No, Katniss hisses. She’s nowhere to be seen, but her voice echoes in my head all the same.

Cato grins manically at me. He’s clearly become unhinged in the time I’ve been hiding in the woods. He raises a rock high above his head to crush my skull and makes the same mistake he makes every night. The rock offsets his centre of balance just enough that I am able to make use of my years of wrestling training. Making the most of my good leg, I heave my body off the ground, twisting and pinning him to the earth.

And I slit his throat with my knife, just as I have done every night since the night it first happened in the arena. The gurgling noise hardly registers anymore.

I fall to the ground and stare up at the artificial stars waiting for the false sun to rise. Or to bleed out, whichever comes first.

She steps into my line of vision, staring down at me, her silver eyes glittering. “You did what you had to.”

Katniss frowns when I shake my head. “I should have let him kill me. It would have been better.”

“Then we never would have met, Peeta Mellark. Now wake up.”

When I open my eyes, the sun is rising over the houses on the other side of the courtyard. I lay still and watch it creep slowly toward the peak of Haymitch’s house as I wait for the sick feeling that overcomes me every time I have the dream to pass. I only have one kill to my credit in the Hunger Games, but I’ve killed the same man in my sleep at least 200 times. I will never escape him. But for once, there is no heart-palpitating terror to go along with the dread. Katniss’s presence seems to have soothed it.

Katniss. Just the thought of her makes me sit straight up in bed. She was there. I throw back the covers and quickly haul on some clothes before rushing down the stairs. I grab my rucksack from the kitchen closet and shove my feet into my shoes. I toss in a bottle of water, a couple of pieces of fruit, some cheese buns and I’m out the door and headed for the lake.

The mornings are warmer now, but the more temperate weather makes no impression, so focused am I on reaching the meadow. I usually walk through the Seam in the early morning hours with my loaves of bread, long before the miners have left for work or the children begin their walk to school. It is important I not be seen. A mysterious delivery can be seen as good fortune, especially when no one knows exactly who will receive a loaf of bread on any one day. But if I am caught leaving it on the doorstep, the people of the Seam would consider my offer of bread to be charity and send me away.

I have no bread to share this morning and I march purposefully to the fence. I do not wish to be delayed on my walk to the lake. My strides quickly eat up the distance between my house and the meadow and, before long, I’m scrabbling under the fence and following the well trodden path into the woods. My eager steps do not slow and I push my way through the brush, pressing on for the lake, desperately straining my ears for any sign of her voice.The air is curiously silent, not even the birds are singing this morning. I weave through the trees, pressing on to my destination.

The sun is high in the sky by the time I burst from the woods to the shore of the lake. I expect her to be there. I want her to be there. Instead, there is only silence and still water. I chuck my shirt over the bush near the water and kick off my shoes.

“Katniss!” My fingers hook under my socks and they join the shirt.

“Katniss!” I watch the water for even the slightest bubble. Nothing. I flick open the button on my pants and they fall to the ground. I throw them over the shrub and wade into the water.

“Katniss!” I yell as I splash further into the water. The water is surrounding my hips, clawing at my legs and delaying my progress. “Katniss, please!”

Then I see it, a ripple in the middle of the lake. I call out to her again, aching to make contact at last. I plunge ever deeper, the water swirling up under my arms now. Right where Katniss should appear, a fish jumps high, snatching a bug out of the sky before sinking back into the depths of the lake, and I feel like a fool for coming out here. She’s obviously not coming. Disappointment surges over me and the water drags at my limbs as I slog back to shore.

It takes a few minutes before her voice penetrates the noise of my own splashing.

“Peeta Mellark!” I whip around and see Katniss’s head bobbing above the waterline, her face full of desperation. “Peeta! Wait.”

She propels toward me, her strong arms slicing through the water like knives. Now that she’s closer, I can discern the dark shadows under her eyes.

  
When we’re eye to eye, she grasps my shoulders. “The dreams, Peeta,” she rasps. “If I must live them with you, I need to understand. Tell me.”

I close my eyes and sigh even as I nod, because I know that she’s right. I’d already resigned myself to telling her the story. It’s not an unreasonable request and I’ve missed her so much that I’ll do almost anything to keep her with me. Even tell her about the Games. Wordlessly, I start back to shore as she coasts along beside me.

It’s warm enough today that I have no need for a fire, but I find myself back in the same spot as our last time together. Katniss settles back on her rock and watches me expectantly.    

I pick up a stick and drag it through the dead coals left by my fire two weeks ago.

“My people know almost nothing about the time before the Dark Days.”

“The time of the sky fire,” Katniss clarifies.

“That’s right,” I confirm. “That ‘sky fire’ was caused by a terrible war. Our country is divided into 12 districts. There used to be 13, but District 13 led a revolution of the Districts against the Capitol.”

Katniss frowns. “What is this, the Capitol?”

“Where our president lives, and his…” My mind whirls as I try to find a way to explain the phoney opulence and thoughtless arrogance of the Capitol.  “Followers, I guess? The people who support him and benefit from the way he runs our country?”

Katniss nods in understanding. “This president, he is like a chieftan?”

I hear a screech from above and look up. A hawk circles overhead before diving down into the lake and then soaring away with a fat trout in its claws. I wonder briefly if his fishy belly is full of flies.

“A bit,” I tell her, using the stick to scratch pictures into the sandy mud at the edge of the lake. “He is corrupt, and he allows the people in the districts to starve while we work to support the Capitol. It’s been that way for a very long time. That’s why there was a revolution, but it failed. Twelve of the districts were defeated and then the Capital dropped bombs on District 13. Blew it up, right off the face of the planet. They created the Hunger Games after that, to remind us that the Capitol is all powerful. Every year, each district must provide one boy and one girl to serve as Tributes in the Games. Their names are chosen from a bowl and then they are sent to fight to the death for the entertainment of the Capitol.”

Katniss’s face is stoney. “You were chosen.”

I open my mouth to answer, but the words are stuck. I clear my throat and manage to whisper, “Last year.”

Neither of us say anything for a few minutes. I prop my elbows on my bent knees, my stick held lightly in my hands as I bounce it up and down.

“I hid in a cave the woods for a long time. I made a spear and caught fish. I collected berries. I camouflaged myself and hid in plain sight sometimes to steal food or figure out what the others were up to. Finally, there was just us two, Cato and I. And I knew he had enough food and weapons to wait me out indefinitely or until the Gamemakers forced us together, so I packed up my things and went to him. I knew he’d probably kill me, but at least it would be over”

Katniss turns her face up to the sun and it kisses her olive cheeks, the tawny tips of her bare breasts tilt skyward while her dark hair tumbles in a waterfall down her back.

“So you are a warrior,” she says to the sky.

I snort. “Hardly. I’m just the guy who managed to survive in a fight he didn’t ask to be a part of.”

She side-eyes me. “Among peaceful peoples, that is the very definition of a warrior.”

I would never accuse the country of Panem of being peaceful, so I don't say anything to that. Instead, I offer her some lunch. She’s fascinated by the idea of sharing a meal, but says she can’t eat anything of mine without something to share.

“You could sing for your supper,” I offer, but that only earns me a scowl and an insistence that she can provide her share of the meal, thank you very much.

I wait on the shore while she’s off diving for our dinner, and start gathering some sticks to start a fire. I’m guessing raw fish is a regular part of her underwater diet, but that is just not appealing to me.

I’ve got the fire snapping and crackling by the time she returns with a healthy-sized trout. She sits beside me on the beach, her still glistening tail still resting in the shallows.

“I’ve been eating the freshwater clams, mostly,” she explains, “But he looked nice and fat.”

I grab my knife from my pack and try to figure out how to prepare him for the fire.

Katniss stills my hand. “First we must thank the fish for giving up his life so that we can eat,” she says, closing her eyes and muttering a few brief words I don’t quite catch. She holds out her hand for the knife and once it’s clutched in her fist, deftly slits the trout’s belly and removes all the entrails.

“We’re going to cook him, right?”

As I feared, Katniss gives me a puzzled look. “Cook him?”

“On the fire.” She still looks confused and so I get up and cut a green branch off a nearby tree. I thread it through the fish’s mouth and out his gills before propping it over the fire. “If you don’t like it, I’ll try it your way next time, okay?”

Katniss looks longingly at the fish and I realize that she’s hungry.

“Would you like a cheese bun, Katniss?”

“Cheese bun?” She doesn’t understand -- again. The combination of her perplexed state and her annoyance with not knowing has twisted her face into such an odd expression, I have to turn my back or I’ll laugh out loud.

When I turn, I loosen the cloth I’d tied around the rolls. “Cheese buns,” I offer her. “I baked the cheese right into the bread. Try one.”

“Bread?” Her eyebrows fly upwards.

“I suppose you don’t eat bread,” I reply, trying to reassure her, “since you spend most of your life underwater. Can you eat it?”

She nods slowly. “I can eat anything that humans eat.”

“Well, I can vouch for these. It’s my father’s recipe. They’re a best seller in the bakery.”

Katniss takes a tentative bite into the flakey roll. When the salty, yeasty flavour meets her taste buds her eyes roll and then close in contentment. She sighs happily and her pink tongue darts out over her lips. “You make delicious bread, Peeta Mellark.” 

Her expression of ecstasy burns into my brain for recall later. I check the roasting fish, seizing the opportunity to adjust myself while my back is turned. The trout is flaky and white, so I remove it from the fire and bring it back to Katniss. We pick the meat away from the bones and gorge ourselves on fresh fish and the soft buns. I can’t remember a time I’ve enjoyed a meal more. Katniss devours everything with gusto, and I’m left to wonder what she usually eats.

“So, if you’re a mermaid, how can you eat seafood?”

“Because I prefer not to starve,” she snarks.

“I know that, but… aren’t you part fish?”

She rolls her eyes. “No. Closer to a dolphin, really. And even then… not really. We are who we are. But everything in the sea eats something smaller than itself to survive.”

We toss the fish bones into the fire and I bring out the apples I packed in my bag. I pass one to Katniss before I finally work up the courage to ask Katniss more about herself.

“Is your home in District 4?”

“I’m sorry, what?” She’s distracted, turning the rosy red fruit over and over in her hands, trying to decide what to do with it.

“Like this,” I say, and my teeth snap into the apple’s tight skin. Katniss copies me and then smiles when the sweetly tart juices flow into her mouth. I chew my bite slowly and swallow. Katniss copies me.

“Your home,” I remind her, once her mouth is free again. “Is it in District 4?”

“District 4?” I can hear the puzzlement in her voice.

“Where we met the first me.”

“Oh, Pacifica,” she replies. “No. Not there. That is even farther from my home than here.”

I wonder where she’s talking about. The Capitol-approved textbooks at school taught us nothing of the rest of the world.

“The sea is salty and warm, not like… this place. Or like Pacifica. Our sea is green and rich with life. We live in the city below the surface, and my people farm the sea plants and care for the fish. We take only what we need to survive and we waste nothing.”

“What’s it like on the surface?”

“Palm trees. White sand. Little houses clinging to the cliffs.”

“Sounds like utopia.”

“Perfection? Hardly,” she snorts and bites into her apple again. “It’s dangerous to spend any time above the water, at least in places where the humans live.” She purses her lips as she considers. “We only surface during the day in a secret cove that we can travel to through an underwater tunnel.”

It sounds lonely. “Do you have a family?”

“I live with my sister and my parents. My sister is training to be a healer, like my mother. My father is Chieftan.”

It’s just my luck that the girl I share this strange connection with happens to be the Chieftan’s daughter. He’s probably sharpening the prongs of his trident as we speak. “I bet he was just thrilled to hear about me.”

Katniss presses her lips together and swishes her tail in the water, like there’s something on the tip of her tongue that she can’t express, so we sit in silence, listening to the occasional twitter in the trees and the gentle lap of the lake on the shore. I can’t remember the last time I’ve been so content. I’m over by the bushes getting redressed when she speaks again.

“My parents were lucky enough to find their mates under the sea. For many merfolk, it is a very simple thing. I always knew it would not be simple for me.”

I double knot my shoelaces and return to the fire. “Why wouldn’t it be simple for you?”

She huffs. “I am Katniss. Priestess. Guardian. It could never be simple.”

Her eyes are a swirl of unexpressed emotions. It’s like watching the sky during a summer storm. Unable to help myself, I twirl a lock of her still-damp hair around my finger and then let it spring free. “No, it’s not simple,” I say. “There’s so much I don’t understand. Like, how did you end up in my dream last night?”

She bites her lip. “I’m not sure. I was on duty at the City gates when the vision came over me. And I just couldn’t watch it again, watch it and do nothing. I remember thinking that I needed to help you and the next thing I knew, I was beside you.”

“With feet,” I say, and she blushes.

“With feet.” She brushes her fingers through the sand. “Anyway, did it help?”

“You having feet?

“That I was there. That I distracted him.”

My hand finds its way to hers and I lace our fingers together. “It always helps when I feel your presence, but yes - seeing you in that moment - it helped.”

She gives a satisfied nod. “Good. And the dreams will stop?”

I wrap my arms around my knees and look out at the water. “I don’t think they’ll ever go away. Not completely. But at least today, I didn’t wake up paralyzed with fear.” I find a pebble in the sand and throw it into the water. We watch the ripples fade away in ever larger circles until they disappear. “I was afraid I’d never see you again. That you’d decided.”

She peers at me cautiously from under her eyelashes. “I thought I had. But the visions and dreams did not stop. So I consulted our high priestess. She said the link between matched pairs cannot be severed in anger.”

“It certainly felt like you were gone.” My legs are restless and so I begin to pack up what’s left of the picnic. “I had no sense of you.”

Katniss scowls. ”I did not want you to. Then I talked to my father. He said that if my mother had been able to sever their connection every time he annoyed her, I would never have been born.”

I think of what passes for a relationship in the house I grew up in and I wonder whether my mother would have judged my father worthy. Somehow I think her measuring stick is different than the one Katniss is using.

“I’m sorry I annoyed you. I just… I hate to talk about it.” Her tail sways back and for the in the water as she considers my words. “I know we just met, Katniss, but I feel like I know you. And I missed you.” I lay my hand, palm open, on my lap and she takes it in her own. Heat pulses from our palms, the warmth extending up my arm and wrapping around my heart. When I glance over at Katniss, her cheeks are flushed and her lower lip is caught in her teeth. I bump my shoulder against hers and she looks over at me, her blush deepening. She returns my smile with one of her own.

We sway toward each other until our lips meet, a tentative press of her rose-coloured flesh against mine. Katniss inhales sharply, then relaxes as my hand finds its way to her cheek. It’s chaste as kisses go, glowing with the sweetness of a first encounter, still but different from any first kiss I have ever had. Maybe it’s because I’ve been seeing her in my dreams for so long. Perhaps it’s how much I’ve missed her these last weeks, but there’s a rightness to this kiss, a knowing, that I have never experienced before. My thumb brushes over her cheekbone, tracing softly, as I pull away.

Her eyes flutter open and her fingertips flutter to her lips. “You kissed me.”

“Do I have something to apologize for?”

With a quick shake of her head, Katniss clasps my face in her hands and mashes her lips against mine once again. My fingers weave into her hair, our nervousness abandoned as our lips move in concert. My heart is pounding in my ears when I ease back, stroking her hair before leaning in again to capture her bottom lip between my own. She tastes of apple, and of innocence. I kiss her brow.

Her head in my hands, I whisper my next words into her hair, her slender fingers wrapped around my wrists. “It’s getting late and I have a long hike. I need to go.”

Her gaze meets mine. “You’ll be back tomorrow?”

“I will.”

She nods and releases my arms. I jump up, dusting the sand from the seat of my pants and reaching for my rucksack. My feet barely touch the ground all the way back to the fence. I listen for the hum of electricity, but it’s off as always and I scramble beneath it before hiking back home, my step lighter than it’s been since Effie Trinket pulled my name from the reaping ball. Haymitch is out on his porch as I arrive home. I toss him a quick wave as I trot up the steps and let myself into my house.

In my kitchen, I throw together a quick sandwich and carry it into the studio. The memory of her is still fresh in my mind’s eye and I want to attempt her face at least once more before I go to bed. With the sandwich clutched in one fist, I attack the canvas with renewed vigor, desperate to capture the fullness of her lips, her pert nose and the smoke in her eyes.

It’s well past midnight before I am satisfied enough with my work to shut off the lights in the studio and make my way upstairs to bed. As I fall asleep, I’m already planning what to take to the lake with me in the morning.

* * *

The sun is beating down on me as I pick my way across the scalding sand. The breeze blowing off the water stirs my hair and makes it hard to carry my blanket and the basket I’ve brought with me, but at least the air is warm.

When I reach the water’s edge, I spread my blanket on the sand and settle down to wait. I haven’t seen Katniss since yesterday when she kissed me goodbye before leaving our rooms over the bakery. She was on duty, guarding the mercolony.

Rasmus surfaces first. His pudgy fingers shoot up in an enthusiastic wave when he spots me. He darts below the surface again and then leaps high into the air, his tail glistening in the sun. When he hits the water again, he shoots toward me at top speed.

He’s walking on his hands in the shallow water on his way to the blanket when Katniss and Willow appear, Katniss’s expression frantic. It seems Rasmus has gotten away from her again.

“He’s here!” I call and her faces relaxes in relief before contorting into a scowl. She starts swimming to shore, her pint-size replica at her side.

Rasmus’ blonde curls are in tight spirals from being wet all night. I scoop him up from the water and kiss the apples of his cheeks, still damp from the sea. He giggles and his grey eyes dance. It would melt my heart if I didn’t know that he’d just terrified his mother.

“Hi Babbas. I beated Mama.”

“You know better than to swim away, Little Man. Mama’s not going to be very happy with you.”

His chin quivers and his lower lip pops out. “I didn’t swim away," he insists. "I race-did Mama. I told-ed her.”

“I don’t think Mama’s going to see it that way.”

By the time Katniss and Willow are pulling themselves onto the blanket, a much-subdued Rasmus is already dry and awaiting her verdict, his arms and legs crossed defensively. For as much as our son looks like me, he has his mother’s volatile temper.

“Rasmus Mellark.” Katniss launches her attack before she’s even dry.

Rasmus is already sputtering defensively when six-year-old Willow slumps against me. “Hi Babbas.” She’s exhausted.

“What’s wrong, cookie?”

“Ugh! We’d barely left Papou and Yaya’s house and he was zooming off. Mama told me I had to swim my fastest because Rasmus is so quick. She was afraid we’d lose him or he’d get lost.”

I kiss the top of her dark head. It’s still damp. “Well, you made it, so good job, Sweetheart.”

Her brows knit into a familiar scowl. “He’s so naughty. It’s not fair.”

She’s begun to dry off, so I swipe her favourite tunic from the picnic basket and pass it her way. She’s begun to be shy about her nakedness and I don’t want her to feel exposed when her scales fall away.

I pass Katniss her tunic as well, managing to distract her from the lecture she is laying on our son.

“I brought you something to put on.” She gives me a grateful smile.

“Hello my love. What’s for lunch?”

I lift a hearty loaf of bread from the basket. “The last loaf of bread in all of Atlantis.”

She rolls her eyes. “Petronius.” Then she grins. “I take it business was good this morning?”

I nod and tear off a hunk of the bread and pass it to her, before sharing the rest with the children.

Rasmus pulls out a bunch of grapes and then pops one in his mouth. Meanwhile, Willow waits patiently for some goat cheese to spread on her bread.

“Are you on duty tonight?” I ask Katniss.

Her mouth is full of bread, so she just shakes her head no and I’m elated that I’ll have my family under our roof tonight. I rise so early to go to work, that Katniss takes them to stay with her parents when she’s on duty.

Willow hums happily beside me. She’d much rather be at home in her own bed than at her grandparents. Rasmus is full of new stories. He adores his Papou’s tales of sharks and ships and life underwater. I asked Katniss once if her father’s stories were true. She just smiled mysteriously and said that depended on the listener.

Before long, we’re packing up what’s left of our lunch and headed home for a nap. Katniss was up all night, I’ve been up since before sunrise and the kids are both ready to crash. When my wife’s fingers slip between mine I can’t help but think that I’m the luckiest man alive. If I could freeze this moment, I’d live in it forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know next to nothing about Ancient Greece, so what you found above is the product of a few google searches. We’ll only see the first Katniss once more, so I didn’t want to undertake a huge amount of research. But my headcanon is that Peeta’s people were from northern Europe and taken captive by a Greek or Roman army, eventually securing their release and making their way to Atlantis a few generations back. He was born in Greece and therefore has a Greek name. They gave their son a Greek name as well, but Willow is named for a plant, like her mother. Babbas is apparently Greek for Daddy. Papou and Yaya are Grandpa and Grandma. Or so Google says anyway!


End file.
